Roestock: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Keep your motor and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 first — reading can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Around Roestock, finding it before the engine runs normally means a drain and a thorough flush on the spot. Nothing happened yet? Below, the rest of the page explains the reasons it happens and the how to avoid it altogether.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Diesel goes to your motor — but plenty of newer diesels driven around Roestock and Sleapshyde carry another fluid too. The exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the fumes to clean them, from a separate tank.
There is a filler on every tank. Plenty of motors have a single flap for the two, while some move the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled at every filling station call-out, week in, week out. Far less frequently, the AdBlue side gets filled — normally from a bottle, by a person working out where it goes. Mistakes happen in the gap between the two.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank happens in Roestock
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a message from the vehicle, and running out means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off Tollgate Road, or outside The Crooked Billet on the way home after work.
Unfamiliar motors are second, too. Rentals, new motors and company vehicles put their fillers differently, and the hand reaches for the cap used on the old one.
A spouted bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, once begun, carries on. Bullens Green or the middle of Roestock: it takes the same few seconds in both.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
A couple of seconds is all these take — so check them before you tip anything, on a drive in South Hatfield or a forecourt around Roestock.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap normally isn't. Read it instead of going by position.
- On plenty of cars, size tells: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- Open the flap and look for a label — many cars show what goes in which filler right there.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler sits if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The previous driver knows. Check when you collect a rental or company car — from Welham Green's car park, say — not when the warning appears.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
For the day the warning appears — anywhere it is across Hertfordshire — a routine to follow.
- Pull in somewhere level, engine off, with time in hand — not rushing on the side of Bennetts Close.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and speak the name "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It does the trick.
- Leave your diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Stop once your tank fills or the bottle is empty; before that, pour slowly using its own spout.
- Shut the cap, and check once more — confirm your diesel filler stayed closed throughout. Only then, start the car.
Find at the second or third step that the bottle went into the wrong filler? That is where you stop. Never go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Roestock already?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with no starting your engine. Leave your ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels it alone runs the pump. Filling up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the base of your tank, right where fuel is drawn from.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the Day Bros or the Gulf, ask the staff to help roll the car away from the petrol pump. Your own drive in Roestock is the place it stays.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if your engine has already run. On the A1001, under a mile from Roestock, that means the next junction. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards St Albans, under 5 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Roestock.
What occurs when our engineers turn up in Roestock
Our engineers come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Colney Heath Primary School, near Colney Heath Village Hall or on your own drive. Those answers determine the work and the price, and so we ask what went in, about how much, and if it has run. You get that quote by phone, before anybody sets off.
Next: draining, then a thorough flush of the whole system. Much more than with petrol, it matters with AdBlue: crystals build up, certain metals corrode, and none of it clears out unaided, however long it is left. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Before we go, our engineers start the car and check that it's running smoothly.
Unstarted cars usually mean a half-hour visit from the moment we arrive. The equipment is fine on a live forecourt, and hushed enough for a residential street late at night. Your insurer usually wants the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and both are yours at the end. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Misfuelling cover is included in plenty of insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Roestock itself
Roestock is a suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated near the River Colne and close to the city of St Albans. Roestock sits at an elevation of 77 metres, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Roestock is located near other local places such as Bullens Green, Colney Heath, and Park Corner, and is approximately 16.7 miles from London.
AdBlue drains about Roestock, and Hertfordshire beyond
Roestock is a residential suburb, and the vans that cover it also work the places near it, Colney Heath and Park Corner among them, across the AL postcode area. A postcode starting AL4 0 gets the van to you fastest.
No need to move your car. Draining happens on the spot, whether a drive, a street near St Mark's Chuch Centre, or a lay-by on the way to Roestock Park. If you're near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of St Mark's, ring and ask rather than assuming.
Roestock motorists: the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere in Hertfordshire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — and so leave it off then ring 0333 366 0103.